


We Always Love the Things We Cannot Have

by lookatthestarrynight



Series: Star Wars Shorts and Mini-Series [2]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-21
Updated: 2020-04-22
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:55:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23761933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lookatthestarrynight/pseuds/lookatthestarrynight
Summary: Armitage Hux, General of the First Order, Destroyer of Worlds, regretted few things in life… but this? He regretted this very much. He had not meant to fall for his strange savior, a woman who claimed to be nobody, who disappeared with just as much ease as she appeared. They were bound to meet again... after all, the galaxy works in mysterious ways.[ON HIATUS] :(
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Reader, Armitage Hux/You
Series: Star Wars Shorts and Mini-Series [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1701205
Kudos: 18





	1. Part One

**Author's Note:**

> Just a quick mini-series with everyone's favorite murder general who should not be anyone's favorite. Anyways, hope you like it!!

Armitage Hux, General of the First Order, Destroyer of Worlds, regretted few things in life… but this? He regretted this very much.

He’d landed on a planet for a very routine inspection of an emerging First Order outpost, only to find it completely and totally destroyed. And then, his ship and everyone on it – bar him, of course – was also completely and totally destroyed in a matter of minutes. Somehow, in all the fray of battle, a woman had appeared from nowhere and dragged him to safety. He was grateful, sure, but he had no idea who she was, who she stood with, if she was even _aware_ of who he was.

When they made it clear of the battle, she dragged him into a cave network, guiding him through twist and turn after twist and turn, and he found himself quickly losing any sense of direction that his military-man instincts might have once possessed on this star-forsaken planet. When he finally managed to get a grasp upon his bearings though, he made a sincere effort to establish dominance. He failed.

“Do you even _know who I am_?!”

She spun to face him. “Of course I do. You’re General Armitage Hux of the First Order.”

He gaped.

She grabbed his gloved hand once more and continued her dragging, this time speaking over her shoulder.

“I knew the Resistance would try and get rid of you while you were vulnerable, so I figured I’d step in and save you first. I grabbed a beacon on the way to get you, so I should be able to contact the First Order and get you out of here soon,” she paused, pulling them through a blast door into a room that looked more… homely? “There’s an extra room through there—” she gestured wildly in another direction, “—so you can be comfortable while you’re here, if it takes that long.”

She let go of his hand with a start, as if she’d just noticed she’d been holding it at all. He found himself missing its warmth for some odd reason.

Hux nodded slow, taking in the room around him. It was clean, for a place in a cave network, and it possessed an entire bank of tech on one wall that beeped and notified with a calming regularity.

He turned back to his savior. “Who _are_ you?”

She shuffled, unwrapping the covering on her face, revealing beautiful features marred only by a shimmery scar that danced from the corner of her eyebrow, down her cheek, to the edge of her chin. “I’m nobody, really.”

“You couldn’t possibly be _nobody_. Such a concept does not exist. _Everybody_ is _somebody_. Even my petty stormtroopers are _somebody_ – expendable, but somebody.”

She shrugged. “I’ve been nobody for a very long time, General. No point in making such an argument now.”

Hux’s lips twisted. “What is your name, then, _nobody_?”

“I don’t have a name.”

Hux was overwhelmed with the urge to strangle her out of frustration. How could someone so resourceful, so courageous, so _astronomically stunning_ be so determined to be _nothing at all_? “Then I shall give you a name.”

She looked up at him, something akin to hope – _gah!_ – swirling in her galactic irises.

Hux made a suggestion, and she nodded jerkily in assent. He could live with such a name for this temporary companion of his. With the end of the conversation, though, came the end of her presence in the room. She rushed off, muttering something about “setting up the beacon” and “I’ll only be a minute, make yourself comfortable.” Hux stood in the center of the room, feeling vaguely abandoned, before he plopped himself down on the couch against the wall with a dignified huff.

She hadn’t been lying when she said she’d only be a minute, because she returned with a small smile quite soon after her departure. She bustled about the room, making some sort of perfume-y tea that, quite frankly, swallowed Hux’s senses whole into faint memories of his mother. 

“Would you mind if I, uh, sat next to you?”

Hux was shaken from his stupor by her question, “No, no, I don’t mind at all.”

She nodded, gently folding herself onto the couch, a respectable distance from him. She pressed a mug of tea towards him with an inquisitive eyebrow, and he took it with a short nod.

She hummed, blowing air across her tea. “So, what’s it like?”

“What’s what like?”

“Oh, well, you know—” she flapped her free arm about in a swirling motion for a moment, “—galactic domination, and all that.”

Hux sat up at that, turning to face her more. “I wouldn’t quite call it _galactic domination_ yet, but… it is my job, so I suppose I like it.”

“Oh, c’mon. Surely you feel more than just _like_ about your position… you seem like the ambitious type.”

Hux wanted to be indignant that she’d pegged him perfectly on the first try, but he just couldn’t find it in himself to be mad at such a soul – a fact that was quickly bringing him some manner of irritation.

He inhaled sharply. “I am… _proud_ of my position. How’s that?”

She smiled with all the brightness of a thousand stars. “Much better, General.”

“Armitage.”

“What?”

“You can call me Armitage. For the duration of my stay.”

She nodded in quiet understanding. “Okay, _Armitage_.”

Hux desperately wanted to implore that the galaxy tell him why exactly he liked the way she said his name so much, why he was overcome with the desire to bring her back to the First Order with him, to take her away from this silly little cave. But alas, such a thing could not be done, so instead he shifted just a smidge closer to her, and she didn’t seem to mind.

“So… what do you do every day?”

“Pardon?”

“What’s your routine like? You know, your workday?”

Hux simultaneously wished he was and was not here. “It… is a normal workday. I am a military man; I command the military.” He didn’t want to go into specifics, for fear of who she might be connected to. For all he knew, she could be a spy, playing the part of kind nobody.

She giggled. “Surely you can tell me more than _that_.”

He shook his head. “I’m afraid that I cannot.”

“Would you be more inclined to share if I told you who I was?”

“Perhaps.”

She shrugged. “Okay…well, I’ll share anyways,” she shifted in her seat, pushing the cushions down and unintentionally drawing the pair closer together, “I was born on Chandrila, a bit after the Galactic Concordance was signed. My mother was a Senator, and she wanted me to follow in her footsteps… but I just couldn’t, you know?” He did not know. “So, I left. As soon as I could… it was a little rough and tumble for a while,” she shuffled again, “I got into spicerunning and smuggling and all that, and then I got dumped here one day… and I just stayed. A few years alone and the world just seems to get small, I guess.”

Hux nodded, distracted. By now, there was only a pinch of space between them, and he found that the perfume she wore was equally as intoxicating as the tea she had made. He turned to face her, ever the stiff and uncomfortable military man.

“I’m sorry to hear it.”

She nodded. “Me too.” Slowly, she leaned forward and placed her empty mug on the bin in front of the couch, and then offered to take his as well, which he happily handed over. When she resituated herself beside him, they were practically shoulder to shoulder. Then, she leaned in close to his face, and rational thought began to escape his person.

“I’m not Resistance… if that’s your hesitation, Armitage.”

Hux desperately wished for a way to fall through the floor and escape her clutches – she was a temptress! She was so close, so, so close, and he wanted her to be closer… but he knew he shouldn’t. Armitage Hux, esteemed General of the First Order, shouldn’t. And yet, her lips were now millimeters from his, she was breathing his air, the aura of her was wrapped all around him…

How she had incapacitated him with such ease confused the General, but he found that as her lips touched his, he couldn’t quite find it in himself to care. She pressed forward, her lips parting, inviting him deeper into her soul, and Armitage Hux found himself giving in, pushing closer, wrapping _her_ up in his arms, parting _his_ lips. Her hand wandered to his shoulder, pushing off the jacket that hung there loosely and letting it drop to the couch, pushing him into the couch, crawling atop him. His heart was beating faster, and his breathing got heavier—

And then the beacon alarm went off, and she jumped off of him, off of the couch, and stuttered a quick apology, running to her wall of tech and muttering things under her breath as she made sure the First Order honed in on their location successfully.

She turned back to him, face flush, lips swollen. “They should be here any minute now,” she approached cautiously, collecting the abandoned mugs and walking them over to the sink in the corner of the room, “You should probably, uh, make yourself more… presentable?”

He nodded, sitting back up all the way. He stood up, grabbing his discarded coat and snapping in the air before swinging back to its rightful place on his shoulders. She walked over to him, her hand tentatively reaching up and fixing a few stray hairs on his head, returning his hair to that of a stiff general. Quietly, he reached up and grabbed one of her hands, bringing his lips to the top of it in a quick, polite kiss.

“Thank you… for saving me.”

She nodded, the tips of her ears flushing red. “You’re welcome, Armitage.” Gently, she extricated her hand from his grip and beckoned for him to follow her out of the room, and then out of the cave.

When they reached the mouth of the cave, the First Order was already there, Captain Phasma leading a platoon towards the cave. The General’s savior gently nodded her head in a polite good-bye before she disappeared back into the unfamiliar depths of the cave, and Hux found himself sorely missing her presence already. He let out a stiff greeting to Captain Phasma, who merely nodded towards the ship ahead of them with a modulated “Shall we?” And that was the end of that. The General hoped that one day, he would see that brilliant woman once more – in a moment when what he did would not get between them.

When he spoke with Snoke upon his arrival to the _Finalizer_ , Snoke merely commended the woman, making an offhanded comment that, should he ever encounter her again, she would be a lovely addition to the First Order – that at the very least she deserved their praise. The General agreed, but some part of him never wanted her to set foot on one of his ships, never wanted her to see what he did so up close and personal. Some part of him regretted ever letting her in so quick.


	2. Part Two

It was months before Armitage Hux encountered his enigmatic savior again. In fact, seeing her again in _this_ particular situation had not even crossed his mind, and yet, here he was – thoroughly perplexed and perhaps a bit betrayed.

It seemed as though her existence coincided with inconvenient moments in his life, and this time, he’d been separated from his troops during a search for a _specific_ piece of Resistance scum that had been a nuisance to the First Order’s quest to dominate its most recent planetary acquisition. He was now alone, making his way through the back alleys to head back to his ship. He’d made good headway and was nearly to his final destination when a figure dropped from one of the upper balconies and straight into his path – blaster in his face. He couldn’t see who it was, but he wasn’t particularly worried about his ability to get out of this situation – he wasn’t a General of the First Order for nothing. However, his escape plan came to a screeching halt when the figure removed the scarf covering their face and revealed… _her_ , silvery scar and galaxy eyes and all.

He whispered her name – the name _he_ had presented her with – into the space between them, the betrayal clear in his voice.

“Hello, Armitage.” The blaster was still in his face.

He wanted to reach up and snatch the blaster right out of her hand – so he did. He spun it around to point it at her, taking a step back. The Resistance emblem on her vest seemed to taunt him.

She stood there, hands still held in the place they had been, and she glanced at him, a glint of fear passing through her eyes. Her hands moved back down slowly, as if she was trying to convey that she was no threat.

“Armitage…”

“Don’t, Resistance _scum_.”

She winced. She looked back down at the dirt floor of the alley, and then in a flurry of fabric, she roundhouse kicked the blaster right of his hand – and it hurt.

Hux lost his stiff general composure in that moment, and doubled over, holding his throbbing hand.

He glanced up at her, venomous. “What. The. _Fuck._ ”

She whispered a quiet apology, picking up her blaster from the place her kick had flung it and holstering it. She moved towards him, cautious, and reached for his hand. Ever so gently, she pulled it towards herself, coaxing the leather glove off. A faint bruise was already forming at the knuckles, and she ran her fingers over it with a feather-light touch.

She glanced up at him. “I wasn’t lying. In the cave.”

His lips curled into a snarl. “Yes, _yes you were_. You said, ‘I’m not Resistance, if that’s your hesitation, Armitage’!” His other hand reached between them, grabbing the zippered edge of her vest and tugging on it, the Resistance emblem shining in the dull alley light, “ _This,_ this is _Resistance_. _You_ are Resistance.”

“I wasn’t _then,_ Armitage. I am _now._ ”

Hux stared at her, his hand falling from her vest as she let go of his other hand, taking a cautious step back.

“Why?! Why _now_? What changed?”

She twisted her fingers together, picking at her nails for a moment – hesitating. “I—it was a couple months after you left… they found me; they gave me an offer that I couldn’t refuse.”

“Oh, really?” Hux was livid, “What kind of offer?”

“A family, Armitage. A purpose. A place to be – to mean something.”

“I could’ve given you that!”

“But you didn’t.”

“I would’ve – if you hadn’t _disappeared_ back into that stars-forsaken cave of yours!”

She stared at him, then shook her head, taking another step back. Hux stepped forward, pulling his leather glove back on with a wince.

“I wanted to go back for you, I swear.”

“No, no, don’t say that.”

“Why not?” he stepped closer, the gap between them shrinking even more. Hux could smell that perfume of hers now.

“Because… because—”

“You’ll regret where you are now?” A half-step closer. “You’ll regret joining the losing side?” Another half-step. “You’ll regret _betraying_ me?” They were toe-to-toe now.

“No, no, no—that’s not it, Armitage. _Don’t_ put words in my mouth!” she stepped back, tripping over a rock and losing her balance. Hux reached forwards, righting her, his hands on her shoulders.

“Then what is it?”

Her eyes searched his face and she shrugged his hands off her shoulders.

“I—because I _liked_ you. I wanted desperately for you to come back, but a month passed with nothing, and then another month, and then the Resistance came – and I just couldn’t bear the thought of waiting _alone_ for someone who might not even come.” She took another step back.

Hux stared at her, her confession striking him to the core. “You _like_ me?”

She huffed. “I don’t just make out with any old fellow, Armitage.”

He couldn’t help the shadow of a smile that crossed his face. He reached forward, his hands finding purchase on her arms, near her elbows, and wrenched her forwards, towards him.

“Tell me to stop.”

She stared at him, her eyes shimmering like little nebulas, and shook her head. Hux leaned forward, and pressed his lips to hers, leaning into her body. His hands migrated from her arms to her hipbones, and hers grabbed onto the lapels of his greatcoat, pulling him in more as her lips parted. Her hands curled themselves in the short hairs at the nape of his neck as his lips parted, and Hux couldn’t help but feel like where there had once been two separate souls, there was now only one. She sighed into the kiss, leaning further into him – something he hadn’t thought possible – and he now he wondered if perhaps the First Order would really miss him if he just… took her into nearest empty building and… never left again? But like all good things, this came to abrupt end when her commlink beeped, a familiar and irritating voice sounding from it—

“Hey, cave-dweller, Black Leader here, where are you? We need to get going; we got what we need.”

She pulled away from him, smiling when he leaned forward into her even as they parted. “I—I have to go now, Armitage.”

“Come with me, instead.”

“I can’t, Armitage, not now. You know that as well as I do.”

Hux sighed, nodding, reluctantly letting go of her. She stepped back, wrapping the scarf back up around her face, covering most of that _beautiful_ scar of hers. With a giggle, she pulled something from behind her back and dangled that something – _his blaster_ , he realized with a start – in front of him, before dropping it on the ground between them.

“How—”

“Tricks of the trade… I just couldn’t help it. You were so… _distracted._ ” He could see the teasing smile swirling in her eyes.

Hux snorted, bending down to pick up his blaster.

He began speaking as he stood up. “Well, I’ll see you aga—”

She was nowhere to be found – she’d disappeared into the depths of the alley without even a _goodbye._ He huffed, shaking his head and dusting off his blaster, noticing the little colored piece of fabric now nestled by the trigger. He pulled it out carefully, and realized it was a piece of her scarf – it must have snagged when she took it out from behind her. It smelled heavily of her perfume, and he tucked it into the pocket inside his greatcoat and holstered his blaster.

After all, it was the only proof he had that she’d even been here – that she wasn’t just a figment of his heart’s imagination. Hux straightened his coat and flattened his hair, taking a deep breath. He stepped forward once, twice, three times, and continued his return to the ship he’d arrived in.

By this time, he was sure that Kylo Ren had been left unsupervised for far too long – by this point he had surely impaled one to many potentially useful sources of information just for the fun of it. Hux sighed. This job would _never_ get easier, would it?


End file.
